Determine whether you prefer Debussy or Mahler after listening to works by each at the Websites below or in this week’s Music Folder and after reading about them. Explain the reasons for your preference. Here we find musical composers inspired by poetry and by philosophy. Identify one (1) element within a work that you find interesting or intriguing by either composer, with regard to the manner in which the work is performed or conducted. Describe the types of things that inspire you to creativity.
- Describe two (2) color paintings by different artists (selected from the list or sources in the Explore section below) that you believe represent the following quote by Kandinsky on the subject of color in art. Justify your response. From Concerning the Spiritual in Art: “If you let your eye stray over a palette of colors, you experience two things. In the first place you receive a purely physical effect, namely the eye itself is enchanted by the beauty and other qualities of color. […] These are physical sensations, limited in duration. They are superficial, too, and leave no lasting impression behind if the soul remains closed. And so we come to the second result of looking at colors: their psychological effect. They produce a correspondent spiritual vibration, and it is only as a step towards this spiritual vibration that the physical impression is of importance. … Generally speaking, color directly influences the soul.” – Wassily Kandinsky. Discuss these ideas for the use of color and its impact in our own times, such as its effect for advertising and sales, or its impact in the workplace and home.
Explore:
Debussy and Mahler
- Chapter 33 (p. 1092-4), Debussy; (pp. 1104-1105), Mahler; review the Week 7 “Music Folder”
- “Approaching Mahler and Debussy” – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QYZ1mUupG7k
- Musical selections for Mahler – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RONBzkthUjM (Symphony No. 2, Finale; Resurrection Symphony) or http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbRyttzUzjI (Symphony No. 1, 3rd Movement).
- Musical selection for Debussy – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvnRC7tSX50 (Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune)
Kandinsky on Color
- Chapters 33 and 34, works by Van Gogh, Seurat, Cezanne, Gauguin, Munch, Picasso, Braque, and Matisse
- New York’s Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). Search names listed above at http://www.moma.org/collection/artist_index.php?start_initial=A&end_initial=A&unparsed_search=2
